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Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Greetings all - hope the season is treating you well. I don't get here all that often anymore. The new job is keeping me hopping. And that's good. I'm loving it. I've even been out to the ballpark some.

Take the time to read it if you haven't already. I'm not a lawyer, I don't play one on TV and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. So I don't know what it will mean when it all gets added up. But I don't suspect it will be good.

Eventually, I will get back on here a little regularly and share some of my thoughts for the few of you who care. Like in previous seasons, this team sometimes makes me smile and often makes me scowl.

We did another doubleheader yesterday, though we left the ballpark in the seventh so we could find something quick to eat before the Caps game.

While at Nats Park, My Son the Braves Fan and I made an awesome discovery. At the stand where they used to sell the big ribs, they now sell a variety of hot dogs (are the ribs gone?) - and one of them is served with mac and cheese AND fritos.

I figured it would be 10 bucks. Only six. And, yes, it was as wonderful as it sounds.

I've somehow managed to lose 20 pounds since Dec. 1 and I still have a long way to go. Eating those dogs isn't going to help. I'll have to avoid that side of the joint on future visits.

Finally, thanks to all who have been in touch since I started at The Times. We're up and running, we're having a blast. We're still a work in progress. I like what we've done thus far but we're going to be 1,000 times better a year from now.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

The Nationals beat writer at The Washington Times arrived in town yesterday, long enough to realize her boss was a nut job and her colleagues were cool. We won't keep her around long - by around, I mean around here. She's heading to Viera on Saturday.

Once again, I appreciate all the readership and support for THIS blog, which won't die (Loosers never die, they just go away) but won't be used too often in the future. And I really appreciate the incredible outpouring of kindness and support since I switched career gears again and headed up this-a-way.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

I promised some updates on progress at The Washington Times, plus some links.

So let's start there. Columnist Dan Daly is in Florida to check in on the Nats and spring training. He offers up this take on Ian Desmond and that errors thing.

Dan will be in Florida for a week or so. Not long after he leaves, our new Nats beat writer will arrive. I've hired Amanda Comak to cover the Nats. She has experience with all four major pro leagues in Boston and she's spent time covering the team in Baltimore for Orioles.com. Amanda shared some terrific ideas in our interviews and I'm confident she'll do a tremendous job covering the Nats.

Look for her stuff soon, keep reading Dan and be ready for our section launch date of March 21. We'll have a lot of stuff online between now and then.

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

As those of you who hang with me on Facebook know, things are a-changing in my life. Not an infrequent thing, but this time the change is a good one. A really good one. A spectacular one.

The Looser is going legit again.

The Washington Times is bringing back its sports section. Showing incredible wisdom (or massive stupidity, one or the other), it has chosen me to be the sports editor of the relaunched section.

To say I'm jacked beyond belief is to understate things considerably. I'm jacked beyond belief to the 1,000th power. I've tried other things but the news media is what I know, what I do. And this is home. This is a marvelous area. When I first left 37 years ago to attend VCU, I thought I'd be back one day. Had no idea it would take 37 years.

I'm doing the transition out of one job and into another thing over the rest of this month. As great as this opportunity is for me, I'm still saddened by what's going on with FanHouse and I want to stay at that party until the end. I had a great time there and thought I'd found my final job. I gained some new skills, things that enhanced my qualifactions for this job. I work with a terrific group of people. I will miss FanHouse terribly.

But I'm so very fortunate to have another exciting job to move into full-time, starting March 1. The possibilities, as they say, are endless. I get to build a staff, plan coverage, help make the printed Times sports section something fun to read and the web version a must-bookmark on your computers.

I'll keep this page and post blurbs on it here and there but it will be very infrequent and mostly plugs for things we're doing at the Times. Hey, use EVERY avenue available to plug your product.

I will not stop blogging, however. The editors at Times sports will have a blog and I will still be doing some writing about the Nats and many other sports. This IS quite a multi-sports area.

You can count on me throwing the link to the editors' blog and all our other blogs up here when they're ready.

Marc Lancaster, a FanHouse colleague who has considerable experience covering major league baseball, will be joining me as our Deputy Sports Editor. I'll have two hires to announce very soon and a bunch more to announce shortly. We're not wasting time. We're going to get up and running quickly.

To all those who read these bleatings regularly, I thank you. I've had the pleasure of meeting many of you on my trips to the park (trips that will be a lot shorter once I finally get moved). And I ask you - keep reading at www.washingtontimes.com. And tell your friends. And their friends.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Wow. News travels fast. I heard from SO many of you before I was even off our conference call.

The short word is I can't say much because I don't know much - I can only hope for the best because this job is BY FAR the best I've ever had. I love the job, the people, the work, everything about it. Tuesday, the day after the national championship game, I was already making plans for next season.

I wanted it to last forever. Maybe it still will in some form or fashion. Keep your fingers crossed.

And another very sincere thank you to every one of you who has reached out. I appreciate it more than I can express.

A Better Way To Play

About me

I'm a former newspaper writer and editor who has taken his skills online as a senior editor at AOL FanHouse (www.fanhouse.com). I'm also a reborn baseball fan. I waited 33 years to get another team in D.C. and finally got my wish - should have thought to ask for a better team while I was begging.